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Rank
Rank is a term used to describe the difficulty of an opponent relative to the player's level in Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age II. It is also used to determine treasure quality obtained from containers. Description Hostile creatures are assigned one of five ranks: critter, normal, lieutenant, boss, and elite boss. Rank determines the color of an opponent's name: * critters: labeled in white text * normal creatures: white * lieutenants: yellow * bosses: orange * elite bosses: orange Rank is used to balance encounters based on the player – all things being equal, the normal enemies will be roughly equal level to that of the player; bosses and elite bosses are significantly stronger; and critters are weaker. Enemy's level is calculated as: MIN(max creature type level, MIN(MAX(party level ± rank modifier, minimum area level), maximum area level)) The implication here is that the relative lethality of the enemy adjusts to match the party's level, but the enemies' level is restricted from being too low or too high for the intended difficulty of the area. In addition, bosses and elite bosses also come with extra skills and higher levels of resistance. Finally, changing the game's difficulty level will increase the relative strength of all opponents. In some areas, the developers have set up scripted encounters that are not based on the party's level, like the battle with the Archdemon or the High Dragon in Origins. Ranks are also used for treasure generation. Higher ranked creatures tend to drop more powerful consumables and equipment, the same applies to the containers. Ranks Critter Easy creatures which are significantly less powerful than any party member – the party must engage many of these to have a challenge, some examples include: spiderlings and packs of wolves. Normal Creatures of normal difficulty are slightly weaker than the average party member and pose little challenge to the party, examples include: hurlocks and genlocks. Lieutenant These creatures are stronger than a single party member or an average enemy (in terms of power). For some party members it will be a difficult fight; some examples include: Hurlock Alphas and Stone Golems. In the in-game Tactics menu, Lieutenants are referred to as Elite. Boss These creatures are in general significantly stronger than a single party member or an average enemy. Some examples include monsters such as the Tower of Ishal Ogre, Revenants, the Corrupted Spider Queen, the Broodmother, and characters such as Duncan, Zathrian, Branka, Kolgrim, and Arl Rendon Howe. Elite Boss Elite Bosses are designed to provide a challenge for the entire party. Each Elite Boss has its own unique abilities, some have high hit points, others have special modes that allow them to regenerate health extremely fast. Some Elite Bosses even have traps surrounding their battle arena, and particular scripting gives some Elite Bosses unique capabilities to do any of a number of things. Some examples include High Dragons, the Archdemon, and the Ancient Rock Wraith from Dragon Age II. Scaling Dragon Age: Origins * Most negative effects applied by spells or talents have their duration modified by creature rank and party size. * If the party is not full, the duration of most negative effects applied by a party member is increased by 1 second for every missing party member. A solo player's effects will last 3 seconds longer than in a full party. This is applied before rank adjustment comes in. Creature rank further modifies this duration using a multiplier, as listed below: * Lieutenants and (Elite) Bosses also receive several other bonuses to their statistics, including a health multiplier (2-15), bonus attribute points (2-25), bonus physical and mental resistances (10-30), bonus spell resistance (5-10) and damage resistance (5-15). Elite Bosses also have a multiplier of 1.5 applied to most, if not all, of their physical attacks. * Physical and mental resistances are capped at 25 for normal enemies, at 50 for Lieutenants, at 75 for Bosses, and at 100 for Elite Bosses. Dragon Age II Category:Game mechanics